Document Type
Dissertation
Date of Award
2024
Degree Name
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
Department
Psychology
First Advisor
Frank Schieber
Abstract
Advancements in technology have changed the dynamic of work as it is performed in safety-critical tasks. Today, many systems offer operators the option to ease the burden of complex tasks by offloading subtasks to automation technology. The goal of adaptive automation is to eliminate the need for operators to engage/disengage automation, and instead have automated control of subtasks adapt to the needs of the operator in real time. However, each change in automation also creates a task demand transition, which have been shown to elicit unexpected effects on cognitive workload metrics. Adaptive automation systems need to be ready to account for the workload history of the operator to dynamically adjust how the system will effectively aid the operator. The primary objective of this study was to examine the influence of cognitive workload history on perceptions of recently experienced cognitive workload (i.e., hysteresis). This study aimed to elicit a hysteresis effect by means of an automation handoff of task controls, yielding a low-high-low task demand sequence using a single-dual-single task presentation method. Two sequences of the variable demand schedule were designed to mimic high and low levels of cognitive demand conditions. Comparisons between the first and second low demand periods allowed for the determination of whether the high demand period significantly influenced cognitive workload metrics in the second low period, indicating a hysteretic influence. Results from this study showed that no hysteresis effect was elicited in the data. Multivariate analyses demonstrated that while significant differences were present between the high and low demand conditions, no significant difference occurred between the two low demand periods that couldn’t be explained by other factors. This indicates that the second low demand period was not significantly influenced by the preceding high demand period. These findings demonstrate that hysteretic influences may be less relevant to dynamic adaptive automation task offloading and reloading conditions. Given the results of this study, no significant support can be provided for either the Resource Depletion Hypothesis or the Effort Regulation Hypothesis regarding the hysteresis effect. Additional work is required to examine hysteresis effects in tasks with less salient demand transitions.
Subject Categories
Psychology
Keywords
Cognitive Workload, Hysteresis, Operator State Monitoring, Task Demand Transitions
Number of Pages
219
Publisher
University of South Dakota
Recommended Citation
Vogl, Jon, "A COMPOSITE COGNITIVE WORKLOAD EVALUATION OF THE HYSTERESIS EFFECT" (2024). Dissertations and Theses. 281.
https://red.library.usd.edu/diss-thesis/281